GET LAMP and Interactive Fiction

Because GET LAMP has actual interactivity in the movie, it relies on a number of DVD specifications that, it turns not, are implemented strangely on various software and hardware players. They all work, to be sure, but some seem to not want to highlight menu items. The easy solution is just to run the non-interactive version, but I wanted folks to at least have the chance to enjoy what they paid for properly. Therefore, there is now a GET LAMP Technical Support page that walks you through what’s going on. If any similar issues arise, that’s the page they’ll end up in.

The fact that highlighting within chapter-located links is implemented spottily among DVD software/hardware players showed up right towards the end of things, and I went with forging ahead with the solution instead of some other possibilities that would make things even worse. (Imagine the fun I had checking out those.) DVDs are basically huge trees of interlinked assets with properties on these links, and players all have different attitudes about it. Most surprising is VLC, which you would think would play most everything right (and which is the player I suggest for everything). It doesn’t highlight! But I suspect that this feature I used is in such a tiny percentage of DVDs made that nobody cares. Maybe somebody will care now! That’d be great!

When I was working on this documentary, I wanted it to have certain aspects of the very games they were talking about. One of these aspects was the interactivity, but another was that sense of seeing something differently, of engaging with the work in a way that was completely at odds with how you would normally interact with it. This led to the fact that there’s a lamp in nearly every shot. I’ve had a number of letters about people trying to find them all, so I figured it was time to be clear which didn’t have a lamp shot (usually because I only used closeup shots of the person). Therefore, the new Lamp Game page lays it all out for you. Happy hunting.

10 Comments on “Tech Support and Lamp Game Pages”

Is there also a BBS Documentary game? I could swear I saw one behind one of the interviewees — can’t remember his name off the top of my head — but it was late in the non-interactive version so I didn’t go back to see if there were more.

The BBS documentary only shows up once in any of the interviews, and the interviewee insisted on putting it there, not me. If I ever make another documentary, I’ll stick a GET LAMP in there somewhere for consistency.

My PS3 didn’t have a problem showing the interactive menu after the first part of the documentary, but what confused me was that once the selected branch had completed playing, it jumped directly to the end credits and I didn’t get an opportunity to choose the other two branches. As a result, the only way I was able to finish watching the documentary was to fast forward through the non-interactive version until I got to the branches I had missed. Was that how the interactive version was suppose to work?

What Philip said. Huge thanks for making and shipping this DVD, which I’m still working my way through. The content is excellent, but, frustratingly, the interactive option on disc 1 fails to function correctly on my Pioneer PVR, my Bluray player, and my MacBook. I’ve run out of devices to try it with!

Jason – would it be helpful to you if we list the devices (Manufacturer, Model #, etc) we are having problems with and what the exact problem that is occurring? In my case, I have the interactive menu issue but also noticed that one of the “Play All videos on Page” options on disk two would play the videos from the previous screen. I haven’t double checked this on my Mac Laptop yet but I will.